A History On Dwarven Magic

With Up-To-Date Scholarship by Gunrikvil Stonescribe and the Guild of Scholars within Alzhak Reger - Gozran 1st, 70 IA

Dwarven history is a vast and varied subject, but the most obfuscated topic to those outside of the culture - and even to the less magically inclined within it - is the history of dwarven magic. Long have dwarves been associated with anti-magical tendencies due to our proud tradition of training warriors to fight against enemy sorcerers, but the truth of the matter is the varied philosophies and traditions within dwarven society have allowed for the development of truly deep and complex methods of changing the world to one’s will.

However, before we get into the paper, we must first discuss what magic is. The true definition and workings of magic have been of great contention amongst many scholars, dwarven and non-dwarven, but for the purposes of our research it shall be defined as such: Magic is the ability to channel powers from outside of oneself to change physical reality, mental reality, or metaphysical reality into what one desires. This definition does exclude the rather dangerous and roiling psionics from being magic, and while many would consider it such, to include it would muddy and dampen the definition of magic and thus make it far less clear what we mean, and so it is thusly excluded.

Pre-Verk Magical Traditions

From what archaeologists / excavators such as Dunrik von Steelcrush and the Steelcrush family have discovered deep underground, it seems the dwarven tradition of Gnostic Magic - an animistic form of creation-based magic which takes an incredibly lengthy amount of time to perform, and is still in use to this very day - is far older than we believed. Broken implements of this style of magic have been discovered, estimated to be from before the reign of Verk, implying this tradition is well over 100 years in age, though presumably is far older, as alongside it records of a second tradition would be found.

Rivethun, also known as Dwarven Spiritualism, is an order of dwarven spirit-workers, mediums, psychics, and the sort with an incredibly deep history that deserves an entire paper on its own rights. However, ignoring all the inner politics, notable members, and so on of the group, we shall explore its age. A few brass planchettes with the group’s emblem carved into the boards have been found dating it as well over 100 years of age, but yet again, the information is not conclusive on how exactly old due to destroyed history, and thus we must speculate. The more contemporary style of magic performed by Rivethun members - falling within vancian theory as “psychic magic”, combined with shamanistic spirit pacts and mediumship - implies it came after Gnostic Magic, and the animistic beliefs imply they share lineage, or that Rivethun is the direct child of the ancient Earthforgers. A single letter is found that could support this theory, written in Dwarven, it seems to be a charter for a small guild known as the “Releasers of Secrets'', and has signatures from both later Earthforgers like Grengnir Metalfather and some earlier Occultists such as Zograk Openeye. This heavily supports the theory of the “Releasers of Secrets'' being the predecessor of the Rivethun order.

Verk-era Magical Traditions

Now, the time of Verk’s reign was a horrible time for dwarven civilisation and culture, many suffering from the mad king and his foul necromancy. As such, a lot of magical tradition had large changes from what we can tell, but history is far more well recorded during this period due to oral tradition from the very rare survivors such as Ingrid Flamemother, who will forever be thanked for her contributions to both the Furnacewives and to our scholarship. From her accounts, it seems that “The Furnacewives began around this time as a way to try and fight back against Verk. Normally, dwarven ladies who went and messed  with the goblins were treated horribly, however their closer relation to fire made it so that when trained, they tapped into the new “Sigil of The Maker’s Fire”, treated as being Torag’s forge-flame.” Other changes were noted, however, as during the time a small group of dwarves began down a dark path, creating the Sigil of the Open Gate to try and fight fire with fire - to enact necromancy. They were not able to succeed as evident by how it turned out - after all, more negative energy just assists the undead - and after Verk’s reign they became illegal with penalty of death, but some say a few vile Earthforgers can be found outside of Alzhak Reger causing fallen dwarves to rise and fight on.

The Rivethun had begun adding exorcism to their list of taught esoteric skills, in an attempt to remove the very negative energy empowering the undead. This had not worked, however, due to the powerful reanimation of Verk, and all teachings of it are now lost to time, according to members of the Rivethun channelling those fallen during Verk’s reign. On that note, due to the heavy amounts of death, the mediumship aspect of the Rivethun greatly expanded, creating this image within the minds of dwarves that really mediumship was all that Rivethun was, and in modern days, still is. Though, they did incorporate a new practise from certain archaic divination wizards - the Harrow, a deck of 72 cards featuring beautifully painted images on every one of them. Harrow became massively popular with the Rivethun both as a divination method and a way for younger members to interact with the spirits before they could fully perceive them, or for non-psychics to be allowed in, for some rare members of the Rivethun lack any psychic capabilities, yet their raw skill with Harrow leaves them as well-accepted members, even today.

It’s around this time that enslaved dwarves would begin trading their more exoteric traditions with non-dwarven magical knowledge of the Arcane and more traditional Divine magic, according to vancian theory, and thus the dwarven people learning of it. Of course, the dwarven people had prayed to the Gods and offered devotion before, but their methods were not like the contemporary cleric - it was animistic, based on offerings, and reliant on ritual. This new theory of magic allowed for some incredible discoveries among the Gnostics and Rivethun, the latter finding the new theories rather easy to work with, though some more conservative members denied it as callous and cold to the spirits. This has actually become a piece of contention in modern times among the Rivethun and Wizards within Alzhak Reger, which shall be explored further down in this paper.

“Torag Blessed” Magic, and The King’s Bloodline

The following quotation comes from King Delvar, and explains that we have much work to do in discovering the true nature of this bloodline, for it appears now to be a physical bloodline with some overlap to daemons, which may even have altered the dwarven peoples as we know it, but it is all in the realm of speculation currently, beyond what Delvar spoke: “Torag appeared before me, if but for a short time, and told me of the nature of my blood - it had not been his doing, and not only had it not been his blessing, it had taint from daemons, which he purified from the blood to prevent further corruption. I know not the truth of it, beyond it not being of the Forge-Father’s design directly.”

Contemporary Magical Traditions

And now we get onto modern times. Dwarves have rebuilt somewhat, and magical society is more broad than ever. Earthforgers, Furnacewives, and Rivethun all exist alongside traditional Wizards and Clerics, creating a vibrant ecosystem of traditions. However, this is not without its drawbacks, as small outspoken groups within both Rivethun and the Guild of Arcanists - the modern largest group of arcane casters, even including witches, within Alzhak Reger - have constantly argued over the nature of spirits. Specifically, the usage of binding magic to try and make outsiders do what the caster desires, which the Rivethun have considered a form of slavery and horribly unbefitting of a dwarf, yet the Guild members have argued against it being wrong due to the most commonly bound outsiders either being cosmologically evil or ones who would endanger people despite their cosmological leanings. Both sides remain stalwart, yet nothing violent has occurred between the two groups over this dispute on magical ethics.

Recently, a surge in the rather modern “Spheres” theory has begun becoming popular among younger dwarves. The idea is such - instead of only 7 schools of magic, there are 23 concepts which make up reality, known as Spheres, and the magician actually takes from one of these 23. It removes a fair bit of confusion on what school certain spells belong into, and also has caused quite modular magic to begin being used, but some effects seem mutually exclusive between the theories.